Manga

I'm back in my manga mode. I actually completed a full draft, a pretty good draft, and in fact I must say I'm rather pleased with it. Oh, there's some tweaking to do.

But what I'm doing now, I confess, is drawing it. I can't say my efforts are professional quality. I had a hard time allowing myself to do it. But finally I persuaded myself that "I can't sell it" is a pretty stupid reason for not doing an art project I'm excited to do.

I Made an Animated Film

My first animated film. I love computers. You can do all kinds of things I could never have dreamed of before.

Sam and Frodo take a lovely trip on the Anduin. Enjoy! (But pay attention, the whole thing is only two-three seconds long.)

Back and Forth

Okay, I did work on the transition. It got hard, I got stuck, I got distracted by the summer. I'm back in the colony story. I've been doing a lot of the first visit to the new world, and the lead-up to it. Busy time.

Now I'm distracted from that, by an insane need to build an electric bicycle. Visit http://idledad.blogspot.com for news about that project. Moreover, I've misplaced, maybe lost the flashdrive that had the latest work, with no backup, which has me bummed about writing. If that weren't enough, I've started a new job as a special educator, my first teaching job. Fyah...

Writing Update

I finished all those edits I talked about in my last post. Finished it. Printed it. (Killed a toner cartridge in the process.) Enlisted neighboring author Jennifer McMahon (http://www.jennifer-mcmahon.com/) to read it. Jennifer proclaimed it excellent, saying she felt transported to Uliante, but... she was very busy, and decided she didn't have time to finish it, stopping right around the transition between Part One and Part Two, right where I'd worried that things might lag. She sounded sincere in her description of its virtues, but, I want to write the book that people who are busy don't put down.

She had some thoughts that gave me a direction, and I think it's a good one. It's also possible I might cut out a chapter or two. I'm back into it again, but still feel this beast is near completion.

Still Writing

Things have been crazy this past year, as usual. Sorry I've been away from this board.

Yes, I have been writing. The colonists made it to 44 Bootis A, concluding Part One. Then suddenly I was filled with the inspiration to complete that dang fantasy novel. It looked like it was almost done and would need only a last read-through and copy-edit. Then it turned out that, on the last read-through, I had an inspiration of how to address a long-burning worry I'd had about the transition between Part One and Part Two. Then I realized a character was speaking in the wrong voice, and I needed to rewrite her dialogue. Oh, and, when I wove the scenes of her subplot into the novel, I'd left out one critical one. Hmm, and there were three lowlanders living in the forest who had lowland names, and their names should have been changed to forest names when they were adopted, because the renaming of another character at the end is symbolic of her adoption. Oh, and the torture scene is too graphic, it gives me nightmares, and could get me shelved with horror. Glory, after doing all that I think I'd better read it through again for another copy-edit.

But you know what? I think this novel is coming out good.

Ironically, I'd sent the first chapter off to an agent, as a sort of threat to myself to finish it. (You'd better have it ready if he asks to see it!) I'd initially conceived of the Native American influence as a way to set off what could otherwise be a standard high fantasy story about the magical people in Flimbottomland threatened by the evil Lord Hootchiekoo. Apparently, I was effective. The agent wrote back, and said I had great promise, and wrote very well. Unfortunately, he'd seen the story as being a wholly Native American fantasy, not a high fantasy with NA flavoring, and there wasn't much market for such things.

Keeping the whole story in front of you

For a long time I've had a challenge being able to see the whole story at once, and think about it as a whole, rather than sequentially. This is my latest effort: iconic cartooning. The idea is a simple cartoon that captures the essence of a scene or event. No words are allowed. It is made with symbols of import to the author, with little need for representation.

The clip shown at left is from an early chapter in this story. I apologize for the poor rendering. It covers the journey to the colony ark, and some first events. In the top square, we see a figure with a star on the back of his head and another with flyaway hair. These symbolize Jonah and Mischief, respectively. Mischief is smiling animatedly, Jonah looking away. Heat waves off his head mean he is angry, she irritates him with her cheeriness.

In the second frame are three characters, Mischief with her flyaway hair, then another with curly hair (Avery) and one with dark glasses and a badge (security officer). The security officer strikes Avery with a stun wand that shocks him.

These two little squares describe a scene in which Mischief meets Jonah on the shuttle, and he is rude and spurns her. She moves to sit next to Avery, who is suddenly set upon by security, stunned, and removed from the shuttle, not to be seen again.

The remaining three frames show Mischief trying to make up again with Jonah in the cafeteria, and then Mischief asking the chaplain for news of Avery, where the chaplain warns her that security is watching.

The advantage of the visual format is I don't have to read it, I just have to see it. Moreover, I don't have to think up the right words. I just draw the Mischief icon with a goofy smile and her hand up and I have the feeling of what she is saying without writing it. Seems to be working.

A little Mischief

Okay, here's the protagonist of the latest story. On the right in the cargo pants, name of Mischief. The guy she's messing with, in the tweed, is an older botanist she has a brief fling with.

And here's where they're going: 44 Bootis A, just off the constellation Bootes, 40 lightyears away. Read about it at Solstation (http://solstation.com/stars2/44bootis.htm). But don't tell Mischief, she doesn't know, yet.

Writing Again

Yes, July has come and gone, and I am writing!

After a couple of starts, it seems I am working on a novel about a group that goes to colonize a new world. I started it while I was in school, basically dictating it on my commute and having the computer type it up for me. I've got bunches of pictures for it, I'll see if I can't post something. At any rate, I'm probably about a third of the way into it, having drafted part one, although it is without a title. It's good to be writing fiction again.

absence of action

For those looking for story news, check back in July. That's when I'll be done with my Master's Thesis and writing fiction again.

Yuujin

By the way, if I ever do publish a manga (Japanese-style graphic novel), here's how I'd have to sign my name:

The first character means "evening." The second is "person." It would be written in English as "Yuujin," and pronounced, of course, just like "Eugene." Japanese names aren't the standard in Original English Manga, but the coincidence of this is just too tempting.

Thinking of Jack Williamson

I read in Locus Magazine that the venerable Jack Williamson just passed, at the respectable age of 98. I met Jack Williamson when he won the Lifetime Acheivement award from the Ron Hubbard people, the same time I was winning the Writers of the Future Award. He was 90, a little old man hunched and bent over.

For those who don't know, Jack Williamson is one of the grandfathers of Science Fiction. He stands among Robert Heinlein and Isaac Asimov and others who did not approach the end of the millenium. When he started writing, the term "Science Fiction" hadn't been invented yet, and he and his colleagues spoke of their work as "scientifiction." He published his first story in 1928 at the age of 20. At the age of 75, long past most would have retired, he began a second peak of his career, writing his best work since the 1950s. He published his last story in 2005, at the age of 97.

I confess, with some embarrassment, that I haven't actually read any of his work. I brought one of his novels with me to California, with the intention of being familiar with his work before I met him, but their were several such writers and I didn't get to his. Perhaps for this reason, I spoke only seven words to him. "It's an honor to meet you, sir." I don't remember his exact reply. He tried to say something like "the honor is all mine," except he didn't know who I was so it was hard to say.

He stands in my mind as an icon. He was born in 1908, in the territory of Arizona. Yes, there weren't even 48 states, then. At the age of 10, he and his family moved to New Mexico in a covered wagon. He wrote science fiction before it had been invented, and he wrote it after the usual complainers said that its hey-day was passed. He wrote it after maybe all of his peers were dead and buried, and he died with his pen in his hand.

A lot of history has passed away with him. I didn't know him. But I took comfort knowing he was still there.

Rook

Here is the main character in the current story.

His name is Rook, and no, he's not singing. He's a storyteller, and he's just gotten to the dramatic climax. This picture is actually a mirror image: it's his right arm that's withered. Why? Ho-ho-ho, I'm not telling.

Greetings

So, I started doing a blog as a writing journal, and instead it became a parenting journal. So I thought I would start a separate one to be a writing journal, rather than mix them.

My writing lately has included a lot of graphically-oriented stuff. I wrote a children's book, that I trying to persuade artist DoAn to illustrate. It's a brief, Seussian take on the planets, and the scientific method, and about openess to questioning. Most lately I've been working on a graphic novel, properly known as an OEM, or "Original-English Manga." "Manga," for the uninitiated, is Japanese for "magazine," and refers to the peculiar Japanese style of graphic novel. Manga are so popular in translation that some publishers have started releasing manga-style graphic novels by English-speaking writers and artists. Am I going to illustrate it? Probably not. I'd love to, but it would take too long to really learn how to do it right.

I have also adopted a new visual style of outlining, which involves drawing quick little stick-figure sketches that summarize scenes. It represents happenings much more effectively and succinctly than writing, and the resulting strip-story can be "read" and absorbed very quickly.

I have some pictures, which I will try to post here, as I can.